Does California live up to its socially liberal reputation? Statistics suggest otherwise.

California is generally thought of as a very liberal place. The Democratic Party is certainly doing well; Republicans are at an all-time low almost everywhere in the state.

This applies to social positions as well. The stereotype is that Californians are very socially liberal. California is, after all, home to San Francisco and Berkeley – the natural environment of the godless hippie and homosexual. Hollywood is also located in California, and Hollywood’s not exactly a bastion of social conservatism.

It may surprise some, then, to note that in the past four years Californians have voted against gay marriage, marijuana, and the abolition of the death penalty. These positions were debated in three successive propositions. Each time the socially conservative side won. Here are the numbers:

Proposition

What It Proposed

Socially Conservative Side

Socially Liberal Side

8

No to Gay Marriage

52.2%

47.8%

19

Legalizing Marijuana

53.5%

46.5%

34

Abolishing the Death Penalty

52.0%

48.0%

Each of the propositions had different things going on. Gay marriage was widely expected to win, and it shocked liberals when the people said no. Legal marijuana at first appeared to have majority support. But as the details of the proposition for legal marijuana came out (it was said to be badly written), its numbers plummeted. On the other hand, few paid attention to Proposition 34. The abolishment of the death penalty was never expected to pass, and it surprised few when it didn’t. Yet the end results are remarkably similar for the different contours that the propositions took.

From the numbers, it looks like there’s a socially conservative majority of 52% to 53% of Californians.

Ironically, the social conservatism displayed here might be a side-effect of the same forces behind the Democratic Party’s rise. The growing Hispanic and Asian vote leans strongly Democratic; it’s why the Republicans are collapsing in California. At the same time, Hispanics and Asians (especially immigrants) are – as Republicans never tire of saying – are often socially conservative. South-Central Los Angeles might give the Democratic candidate 80-90% of the vote. That doesn’t mean that it will support gay marriage, legalized marijuana, or the abolishment of the death penalty.

It’s too bad that Republicans can’t channel this social conservatism amongst immigrants into support for the Republican Party.

In many ways Pope Benedict XVI has not been as influential as his predecessor Pope John Paul II. John Paul II was highly loved and good at playing with the media. Benedict XVI, not so much.

Yet if Benedict XVI sets a precedent with his resignation, it may be he who is more remembered by history. Future popes may choose to follow his path, handing the reigns to another rather than holding office until death. In fact, this seems like an eminently sensible thing. A person who’s dying probably would be unable to uphold and fulfill the momentous responsibilities of the papacy. It leaves a chasm in the Catholic Church. It’s actually kind of a mystery why it hasn’t been done before.

The counterargument is that politics may eventually come into play. Popes may be pressured to resign by their detractors or internal enemies. This is a good argument. Yet I think that the benefits outweigh the negatives when a Pope unable to fulfill his duties resigns.

Finally, it has been somewhat shocking to hear the criticism of Pope Benedict XVI by news organizations such as the New York Times. Of course Pope Benedict XVI is a very conservative person; in many ways his views are the exact opposite of your typical journalist. So journalists inherently don’t like him, nor the Catholic Church as an institution. For instance, there’s been a lot of criticism of the Pope with respect to child sex abuse scandals. Yet the Pope has apologized and the local churches have handed out compensation; what more do you want him to do? The Catholic Church is vast, and Rome often has very little control or knowledge about much of what happens in faraway countries like the United States. One ought to give more respect for the Pope during this time. After all, this is a very brave decision for him to make. It’s deserving of respect, not criticism.

The previous post looked at the economic history of the United States over the past two centuries. In that post, what stood out most was the fact that the economy of the United States has always been one of the strongest in the world.

There are three defining moments of American history after 1800, and this post will examine them. They are the Civil War, the Great Depression, and the Second World War. How did these events affect the economy?

The Civil War

Before the Civil War, in 1860, this was how America was doing:
Economically and socially speaking, the United States was better than the vast majority of other countries in the world. The only two countries wealthier than the United States were Australia and the United Kingdom.

The Civil War was a devastating event. It killed more Americans than any other war in history and destroyed the South’s economy. How did that affect the United States?
Well, here’s the United States in 1865. In fact, the population and the economy of the United States has grown. The latter is in large part due to the effective economic policies of the Republican Party under Abraham Lincoln. It is true that living standards have grown slower than elsewhere. Still, the United States is very wealthy and very healthy after its worst war in history.

One ought to ignore the life expectancy statistic here, however. The previous post noted:

…the life expectancy data comes from several sources. From 1989 to the present, gapminder uses US Census Bureau data. From 1933 to 1988 the Human Mortality Database is used. From 1901 to 1932 the Human-Life Table Database is used. From 1880 to 1900 Professor James Riley’s compilation of life expectancy estimates (from over 700 sources) is used.

And what about from 1800 to 1879? Well, here the authors use a simple model. A very very simple model. They assume that all countries go through a health transition, and that the United States had not undergone this transition from 1800 to 1879. So gapminder sets United States life expectancy as 39.41 years for this entire 80-year period.

Obviously this model fails during the Civil War.

The Great Depression

The Great Depression was the worst economic crisis in the history of the United States. Here’s the United States in 1920, before the Great Depression:
The United States is the richest country in the world in 1920, although in terms of health it isn’t doing as great.

Let’s take a look at what happened afterwards.
By 1933, in the depths of the Great Depression, the American living standard is actually worse than almost a generation ago. The good news is that Americans are a lot healthier. So the Great Depression was really as bad as it was advertised.

Look at the other countries, however. As badly as the United States is doing, livings standards are still the world’s best. Only Brunei (due to its oil), Luxembourg, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom have a higher GDP per capita adjusted to inflation and purchasing power parity.

World War II

World War II was good for the United States and bad for most of the rest of the world. In a sense, the United States was more powerful than at any other time in its history in 1945. Let’s take a look at the effect of WWII, beginning in 1940 at the start of the war:
In 1940 Germany and the United Kingdom are almost at par with the United States. As is typical, however, America is slightly ahead of the First World in terms of livings standards but just above-average in terms of life expectancy.

Here’s what five years of war did:
The destruction of World War II does enormous damage to the rest of the world, which falls behind. Only Brunei and Kuwait, due to oil, have higher GDP per capitas adjusted for inflation and purchasing power parity; their low life expectancy shows that this isn’t really an accurate reflection of their true economic strength at this time. At this time, the biggest countries behind the United States are Canada and the United Kingdom. The United Kingdom has a GDP per capita (adjusted for inflation and purchasing power parity) of $9,931; the United States $17,615.

Of course, this nice situation for the United States couldn’t have lasted forever. Absent a nuclear attack against the Anglosphere, the rest of the world would have started to catch up with the United States again. And, indeed, this is what happened.

Conclusions

It’s quite interesting how relatively little affect these great historical events had on American livings standards and life expectancy. Unlike other countries, the United States just keeps on a slow and steady growth path. It remains near the top or at the top. It would take quite a change – something far worse than the Civil War or Great Depression – to destroy this equilibrium.

The United States economy is a subject that is very much on the mind of Americans today. It’s also a very obviously influential part of the world; the American consumer market, for instance, often sets trends around the world.

Let’s take a look at the history of the United States economy. How did the American economy become as big and influential as it is today? We begin two hundred years ago, in 1800. Note that the next post will look at three specific moments during the American economy.

1800
This picture comes from the website gapminder, maintained by a Swedish professor. I have previously used this website to compare North Korea’s development with South Korea’s, here. That post has a good summary of what this graph is saying:

Gapminder shows graphics of different levels of every imaginable type of statistic amongst the world’s varying countries.

This is the most basic graph: it shows wealth and health…The y-axis is life expectancy. The left axis is income per person (in dollars adjusted for inflation and purchasing power parity) put on a logarithmic scale (so that the difference between $1,000 and $2,000 is just as important as the difference between $10,000 and $20,000; this makes comparing things much easier). As one would expect, wealthier countries generally have higher life expectancies.

So this is the world in 1800, more than two centuries ago. Let’s take a look at what happens next:
The United States does pretty badly this generation; it basically ends up making no progress economically nor in terms of health.

1820
Nevertheless, even as early as 1800 and 1820 the United States is one of the world’s wealthiest and healthiest places. A lot of economic analysis has been done on how America became so wealthy. Well, the answer is that the United States always has been this way, as this graph indicates. Even during the colonial era the English colonists enjoyed arguably the highest living standard in the world.

Let’s look at what happens in the next twenty years:
This is the era of Andrew Jackson, and the United States makes progress during these years. The economy grows, although life expectancy does not.

1840
Again, the United States is on top of the world in 1840. There are, however, two European countries (or orange circles) that have been consistently ahead of America since 1800. What countries are these? Well, the bigger circle at the very right is the United Kingdom. It’s unsurprising that the United Kingdom is the world’s wealthiest country during this period, considering that it’s at the forefront of the Industrial Revolution. The smaller circle is the Netherlands.

What happens next?
Well, America’s economy grows at the fastest rate yet. The antebellum era apparently is quite good for the United States economy. Life expectancy, however, remains flat.

1860
While economic growth has been steady during these sixty years, life expectancy has stayed flat. Here the weaknesses of gapminder come into play. One should realize that gapminder is not the literal truth; it’s a graphic that does its best to resemble reality.

This graphic is as reliable as the data it’s based off of. In my analysis on North Korea and South Korea, there was a huge problem for North Korean data – it didn’t exist or was false. So basically the entire North Korean graphic was a model using artificial numbers created by the authors of gapminder.

The economic data for the United States derives from a study titled Macroeconomic Crises since 1870. The authors of that study have created a dataset for their study. This is what gapminder uses. In general, it’s quite reliable; United States economic statistics are the best and most comprehensive in the world, even today.

On the other hand, let’s take a look at life expectancy during the Civil War and Reconstruction era:
The destruction of the Civil War doesn’t stop the United States economy from growing yet again. On the other hand, common sense indicates that life expectancy fell during the Civil War. After all, more Americans died in the Civil War than in any other war in American history – and America’s population in 1860 was a lot smaller than the population today. What gives?

Well, the life expectancy data comes from several sources. From 1989 to the present, gapminder uses US Census Bureau data. From 1933 to 1988 the Human Mortality Database is used. From 1901 to 1932 the Human-Life Table Database is used. From 1880 to 1900 Professor James Riley’s compilation of life expectancy estimates (from over 700 sources) is used.

And what about from 1800 to 1879? Well, here the authors use a simple model. A very very simple model. They assume that all countries go through a health transition, and that the United States had not undergone this transition from 1800 to 1879. So gapminder sets United States life expectancy as 39.41 years for this entire 80-year period.

1880
By 1880, the United States has caught up with the United Kingdom. Out of all the countries in the world, only Australia is wealthier. On the other hand, Americans are generally in worse health than the wealthiest European countries.

Here’s the United States as a new century dawns:
With a new dataset in use and the advent of new medical technologies, American life expectancy jumps enormously. On the other hand, the economy doesn’t do that great. It’s commonly said that during this era the United States undergoes industrialization and becomes a world power.

1900
One reason for American power is due to the population increase, fueled by immigration. The United States population is on par with most big European states during this period. It seems that a lot of the expansion of American power in this time is based on population growth; progress in living standards isn’t exceptional. Despite this, the United States has become the world’s richest country.

This continues during the Gilded Age and World War I:
The Gilded Age is commonly thought of as the time when the United States really became a great power. The population and life expectancy increase is impressive (note that the outlier in terms of low life expectancy is the year 1918). Yet there’s an awful amount of economic backsliding and economic crisis during this period.

1920
In relative economic terms, however, the rest of the world has been doing even worse. This is mostly the result of World War I. American living standards are squarely ahead of everybody else in 1920, although once again American life expectancy is somewhat subpar.

Then comes the Great Depression. Did that knock the United States off its track?
Kind of. Life expectancy continues to improve, but again the improvement in living standards isn’t great. Indeed, this whole era from 1880 to 1940 features regular economic crisis and chaotic patterns in economic growth.

1940
Nevertheless, the United States is still very wealthy and fairly healthy in 1940.

Let’s take a look at World War II:
Here a new pattern sets in. Unlike the previous 80 years, the United States economy starts growing at a steady rather than chaotic rate. Life expectancy also increases, but by a lesser extent. There’s a huge economic boom during the war years and – surprisingly – no drop in life expectancy during the war.

1960
The ’50s and ’60s are commonly and nostalgically seen as the time when the United States was on top of the world, and this picture provides good evidence. Economically the United States is ahead of everybody else to the greatest extent in its history. On the other hand, the Soviet Union does have a bunch of nuclear weapons pointing at the United States. People tend to forget that fact.

So what happens during the Vietnam War and oil crisis?
Well, the economy does pretty well, although it slows down during the latter period. Life expectancy is the opposite; it slows down during the first part and then increases during the second part of these two decades.

1980
After a great economic boom, the rest of the West and Japan have almost caught up to the United States. In a sense, things are back to normal. In another sense, America’s allies are closer to its economic living standards than at any other time in history.

Then come the Reagan and Clinton years:
The pattern here is quite similar to that from 1960 to 1980. Both living standards and life expectancy increase slowly but steadily.

2000
Again, the rest of the First World is nipping at America’s heels. Yet only four tiny countries are actually richer than the United States. As is historically the case, life expectancy in these countries is higher than in the United States.

And finally, the past decade:
It’s a pretty terrible decade; the United States basically goes nowhere.

Today
Strangely enough, however, the picture looks pretty similar to that in 1980. Despite a decade of terrible American economic growth, the rest of the First World hasn’t surpassed the United States. Right now a total of eight “countries” are wealthier than the United States: Brunei, Hong Kong (China), Kuwait, Luxembourg, Macao (China), Norway, Qatar, Singapore. As throughout history, American health is relatively worse.

Conclusions
There are several patterns throughout this analysis. Relatively speaking, the United States has always been at the top. It’s always been wealthier than almost all other nations. On the other hand, the United States has also always had relatively low life expectancy for its living standards.

The United States has also always grown at a slow but steady rate. There are periods of slower growth (such as in the early twentieth century) and periods of faster growth (such as in the middle of the twentieth century). But the growth is always there.

Finally, ever since World War II there has been a cluster of First World countries just behind the United States. This cluster of countries, however, has never actually caught up. I am quite curious to see if that day will ever come. Will countries like France, Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom ever actually surpass the United States?

One of the best ways to learn about the politics of different places is to read their newspapers. To that extent, I recently had the pleasure of reading a Bolivian newspaper supportive of, or published by, the government.

The topic was the Rio+20 conference in Rio de Janeiro, a conference devoted to fighting global warming. The conference came in with low expectations after the failure of talks against global warming previously. It ended up issuing a vague statement affirming that it was important to fight global warming, but which didn’t actually do anything to further that goal.

This newspaper held very strong opinions about the conference. The conference had started with a proposal (Document Zero), made by developed countries, with strict obligations and a detailed roadmap for fighting global warming. The theme of this proposal was the “green economy.”

Here is how the newspaper viewed Document Zero:

The environmentalism of the green economy is a new colonialism of two types. On one hand, it’s a colonialism of nature by commodifying the natural sources of life. On the other hand, it’s a colonialism of the countries of the South whose backs are burdened with the responsibility of protecting the environment destroyed by the industrial capitalist economy of the North. The so-called environmentalism commodifies nature, converting each tree, each plant, each drop of water and each natural being into a market good submitted to the dictatorship of the market which privatizes wealth and socializes poverty.

The title of this article was: The “green economy” is the new colonialism for subjecting our peoples. The newspaper advocated an alternative – The vision of Bolivia to achieve the paradigm of Living Well.This alternative was described as the following:

It’s the continuous process of the generation and implementation of aspects and social, political, cultural, ecological, economical, productive, and affective processes as well as communitarian methods and actions done by citizens and public management for the creation, provision, and strengthening of conditions, capacities, and material, culturally adequate, and appropriate methods, promoting relations of solidarity, of support and mutual cooperation, of complementarity and strengthening of uplifting community and collective ties to achieve the Living Well in harmony and equilibrium with Mother Earth.

This nice-sounding and extremely vague Living Well was to be implemented through things such as “conserving the components, zones and systems of life of Mother Earth in the framework of an integral and sustainable management.”

The newspaper achieved its goal. The G77+China succeeded in removing almost all the components of the Document Zero envisioned in the rough draft, with their strict obligations for fighting global warming and punishments for not meeting those obligations. They succeeded in making the neocolonial concept of a “green economy” “only a tool – not a model nor a vision of development.” They replaced it with a statement that included such niceties as “recognizing the planet Earth as our home and that the expression ‘Mother Earth’ is common for various countries and regions.”

This is a typical example of the leftism that permeates Latin American thinking, and there is some logic in it. Many poor countries believe that their economic development ought not be stifled by agreements to fight global warming, which might include growth-reducing measures such as carbon taxes.

Sometimes this type Latin American leftism does good. Evo Morales has done a pretty good job of managing the Bolivian economy, as have most of his fellow leftist compatriots. Being the first democratically elected indigenous president of Bolivia is a huge accomplishment which deserves to be celebrated.

Yet Latin American leftism can also do a lot of bad. As this example illustrates, for instance, it can help defeat efforts to fight global warming. Indeed, Western advocates of a “green economy” are not the ones who the ones who would implement a new type of colonialism to subjugate the peoples of Latin America. It’s the Western opponents of a “green economy” who Latin Americans ought to worry about.

A number of political analysts have labeled Hurricane Sandy as one of the factors that helped Barack Obama win re-election. Here, for instance, is a typical news analysis about it. Some conservatives have even gone so far as to say that the hurricane gave the election to Obama. It wasn’t the fault of the Romney campaign that he lost; it was the hurricane.

By the by, Obama wasn’t the only president who managed to get a hurricane to hit a major American city during his term. Our previous president George W. Bush also had the good luck of having a hurricane hit a major city in 2005. Strangely, however, Hurricane Katrina did not improve Bush’s popularity. In fact, his approval ratings plunged after the hurricane.

Why did Obama benefit from Hurricane Sandy, while the opposite happened with Bush and Hurricane Katrina?

This is of course a rhetorical question. Natural disasters are politically neutral events. They can hurt or help an incumbent. What matters is the response, not the hurricane.

A lot of people visit America. According to the latest estimates, about sixty million people came in 2011.

One interesting way to track tourism in America, and by association the country’s openness, is through looking at the number of nonimmigrant visas granted to other countries. The State Department has a number of interesting statistics on the issue, which can be accessed here, here, and here.

Let’s take a look at the statistics. Here is the total number of nonimmigrant visas granted by the United States:

Nonimmigrant visas are essentially tourist visas, although they cover a bit more than that (for instance, they might include special visas for diplomats or airline staff). In theory they provide a good, albeit somewhat exaggerated, estimate of the number of tourists from poor countries who go to America each year.

There are quite a few interesting things in this graph. Firstly, there are a lot fewer than sixty million visas issued. This is because the vast majority of tourists in America come from countries in which visiting America doesn’t require a visa. These countries are places such as Japan and Germany, which send very few immigrants to the United States.

There is also something to be said about the number of visas issued. It’s worth noting that America issued the highest number of visas in 1988, more than two decades ago. Nonimmigrant visas then declined greatly in the early ’90s, before rising again. In the aftermath of 9/11 the number of visas issued declined once more; indeed, America still issues fewer visas than before 9/11. The opportunity cost in lost tourist revenue due to these restrictions is unknown, but probably fairly significant.

Let’s take a look by continent:

I could only get continent data up to 1991. Nevertheless, the data is quite interesting. The highest number of visitors to America from poor countries come from Asia and North America, although South America’s share is rising.

Here is a better look:

One can see a lot more detail here. The patterns by continent are very different.

Let’s take a look by continent, ordered alphabetically. Here is Africa:

Nonimmigrant visas issued increased substantially until September 11th, upon which time the harsher security measures drastically cut visas. Not many Africans visit America; only several hundred thousand are allowed per year.

One belief that many well-educated Americans have is that Venezuela’s government controls its media. According to this belief, this is the reason why Hugo Chávez continuously wins elections. Since all the television channels and newspapers are pro-Chávez, the common people are “tricked” into supporting him.

In fact, this appears to be a completely false myth. On balance, Venezuela’s media is anti-Chávez. A person who watches Venezuelan news coverage, listens to a Venezuelan radio program, or picks up a Venezuelan newspaper is more likely than not to hear bad things about Chávez.

There’s a reason why Americans believe that Chávez controls the Venezuelan media; all the American media continuously publishes stories about media suppression undertaken by the Chávez government. (For examples, see here, here, and here.) These stories are not false in the sense that they describe events which actually happened (i.e. Chávez has taken action against anti-Chávez network RCTV). But they are very misleading.

Let’s take a look at television. Venezuelan television is dominated by four networks: Venevisión, Televen, Globovisión, and Venezolana de Televisión (VTV). Of these four networks, Venevisión and Televen are moderately anti-Chávez, Globovisión is extremely anti-Chávez, and VTV is extremely pro-Chávez. Venevisión and Televen hold 60% of the TV audience in Venezuela. VTV appears to hold only 6% of Venezuelans.

According to this article (published by a pro-Chávez newspaper), during the first week of the presidential campaign three of these four channels gave more favorable coverage to Chávez’s opponent Henrique Capriles Radonski. Televen gave 15 minutes of favorable coverage to Chávez but 28 minutes to his opponent; Venevisión gave 9 minutes of favorable coverage to Chávez but 75 minutes to his opponent; Globovisión gave 56 minutes of favorable coverage to Chávez but 8 hours and 38 minutes to his opponent; and only VTV gave 8 hours and 26 minutes of favorable coverage to Chávez compared with 3 hours and 23 minutes to his opponent.

American media outlets often claim that government television is overwhelmingly favorable towards Chávez. This is true but misleading. VTV, the government network, is biased for Chávez, as the statistics indicate. But only six percent of Venezuelans watch VTV. Another claim is that Chávez often interrupts news programming with hours of cadenas, which this Times article beautifully describes as “torrents of propaganda usually in the form of a speech delivered to a handpicked audience of Chávez loyalists.” But are the cadenas enough to outweigh the 23 other hours of anti-Chávez broadcasting?

Let’s take a look at print media. Venezuela has three major newspapers: Últimas Noticias, El Nacional, and El Universal. Últimas Noticias is pro-Chávez; El Nacional and El Universal are anti-Chávez. El Nacional is owned by Miguel Henrique Otero, a founder of the anti-Chávez organization Movimiento 2D. As for El Universal, this is what it published during the failed 2002 coup d’état against Chávez:

Note that ¡Un Paso Adelante! means “A Step Forward!” in English.

Finally, let’s look at radio coverage. While some American media articles indicate that it’s getting harder and harder to find anti-Chávez radio stations, other sources are more skeptical. For instance, Mark Weisbrot – whose article was actually the inspiration for this post – writes:

According to CONATEL data, only about 14 percent of radio is publicly owned; and since there is more strongly anti-government radio in Venezuela than TV, the opposition almost certainly has more advantage in radio than in other media.

Indeed, it seems that the Venezuelan media played a major role in supporting the failed 2002 coup d’état against Chávez. Coup plotters collaborated with Venezuelan media figures before the coup. The media refused to show statements by officials condemning the coup d’état. When the coup d’état failed, the private Venezuelan networks refused to broadcast the news that Chávez had returned to power.

Since the failed coup, the tone of the media – especially Televen and Venevisión – has become less anti-Chávez. Nevertheless, most Venezuelan media is owned by right-wing business elites who loathe Hugo Chávez. Most Venezuelan media played an active part in in the failed 2002 coup d’état against him.

In writing this post, I should note that I am not a supporter of Hugo Chávez; indeed, I have previously criticized his failure to reduce inequality in Venezuela. If I were Venezuelan, I would vote against Chávez and for the opposition.

But one’s personal dislike of Hugo Chávez has nothing to do with the bias of Venezuela’s media. It’s fair to say that, on balance, Venezuela’s media is biased against Hugo Chávez. Unfortunately, too many journalists writing in too many American media sources have let their dislike of Chávez blind them to the truth. This has left too many intelligent Americans badly misinformed.

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